The Buffalo Bills were an original franchise in the American Football League, which started play in 1960, and they won two AFL championships. The Bills won the fledgling league’s title in 1964, and then in the following year, they repeated as champs.
But 1965 marked the end of an era, the final year of the AFL and NFL as fully independent leagues. The merger of the two leagues into what became a unified NFL with two “conferences” would not be completed until 1970, due to remaining television contractual obligations.
But the 1966 season saw the beginning of a unified championship, decided by pitting the winners of the two leagues against each other in a single game â the Super Bowl.
Bills Took 25 Years to Reach Super Bowl
The name wasn’t officially adopted for another two years, at first simply going by the more straightforward “AFL-NFL Championship Game.” But for the Bills, the real point was that they would not play in the new championship game for 25 years.
Of course, as Bills fans are painfully aware, Buffalo then played in four consecutive Super Bowls, losing all four. To this day, the Bills have not won a single Super Bowl. But since the retirement of Hall of Famer Jim Kelly â who led the Bills to those four Super Bowls from 1991 to 1994 â in 1996, the Bills never had an elite NFL quarterback.
Until 2018.
That was when Buffalo, with the seventh pick in the first round, drafted Wyoming quarterback Josh Allen.
Allen One of NFL’s Elite QBs, But Still No Super Bowl
Allen over the past seven seasons, has become one of the top five quarterbacks in the NFL, ranked by ESPN.com no lower than fifth in all but one of seven key categories of quarterback performance. Allen is the reigning NFL MVP, and led the Bills to the AFC championship game twice, in 2020 and again last year.
But still, no Super Bowl.
The Bills obviously are not going to part ways with Allen. They signed him to a six-year, $330 million contract earlier this year. So if the Bills again fall short of a Super Bowl appearance, will head coach Sean McDermott â the only NFL coach Allen has ever had â take the fall?
NFL Insider Says McDermott’s Job in Jeopardy
NFL experts believe that McDermott is, in fact, on the “hot seat.” Both USA Today and Bleacher Report have already listed McDermott as a candidate to lose his job during or after the upcoming season.
The latest to foresee a potential McDermott firing? Boston Globe NFL Insider Ben Volin, who included McDermott as one of 11 coaches on the “hot seat” for 2025 in a Tuesday column.
Volin listed McDermott alongside Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin as candidates to be looking over their respective shoulders this season.
“McDermott still hasnât made it to a Super Bowl with Josh Allen, and Tomlin hasnât won a playoff game in seven years,” Volin noted. “At some point they have to be on the hot seat, right?”
Late Game Decisions Cost Bills Chance at Super Bowl
McDermott has often come under fire specifically for his in-game management abilities â especially late in games. Most notoriously, in the 2021 season’s AFC Divisional Round, the Bills blew a 36-33 lead to the Kansas City Chiefs with just 13 seconds remaining, thanks in part to a late game play call by McDermott on kickoff that went into the end zone.
“I’ll continue to watch it in my mind and in my gut for years,” McDermott said after that heartbreaking defeat.
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